We built this plugin to seamlessly integrate your WooCommerce store with our specialised fine art fulfilment service. In short, it’s designed to empower artists and galleries to sell museum-quality, archival giclée prints directly to their customers, without ever having to worry about inventory, printing, or shipping.

You can think of us as your personal print studio. We handle the tricky parts of production so you can focus on what you do best: creating and selling your incredible art.

The entire process, from uploading your high-resolution artwork to creating sellable print editions in your store, is managed right here inside WordPress, using a dedicated panel we’ve added to the WooCommerce product editor.

We built Drop Print for artists, photographers, illustrators, and galleries.

If you value quality and want to sell your work as stunning, archival-quality prints without the hassle of managing production yourself, then this plugin is for you. Unlike mass-market merchandise services, we specialise exclusively in giclée printing that meets the high standards your artwork deserves.

We think you’ll love using Drop Print. Here are a few of the core benefits that make our service unique:

Built for Artists, by Artists
After two years of development with real artists, we’ve created the only drop shipping plugin truly built for the art world. It features an artist-friendly product list and a workflow that understands your needs.

Unmatched Artwork Security
Your art is your intellectual property. We are unique in the drop shipping world because we encrypt every single print file you upload. Your artwork is kept safe and secure on your server, during transit, and in production. You can read more about our approach to security on our blog.

Seamless WooCommerce Integration
The plugin adds a dedicated “Drop Print” panel directly into your WooCommerce product editor, making it easy to manage everything in a familiar environment.

Reliable, High-Quality Fulfilment
Focus on your creativity and let us handle the gallery-quality printing, inventory, and shipping.

For artists and galleries looking to streamline their workflow even further, we offer Drop Print Pro.

This is an optional subscription service that unlocks powerful features designed to save you time and money. Pro users receive a percentage discount on the production cost of every single order.

Additionally, a Pro account gives you more control, allowing you to select different shipping methods beyond the “Standard” option available to all users. The flagship feature of Pro is “Auto-production”, which can be enabled in your settings. When active, it automatically sends your paid customer orders directly into our production queue, creating a truly hands-off fulfilment process.

To ensure the Drop Print plugin runs smoothly, your website needs to meet a few key software requirements.

WordPress Version: You’ll need WordPress version 6.0 or higher installed.

WooCommerce Version: The plugin requires WooCommerce version 8.6 or higher to be installed and activated. The plugin will not activate if WooCommerce is missing.

We’ve also ensured our plugin is compatible with WooCommerce’s High-Performance Order Storage (HPOS), also known as Custom Order Tables.

The plugin has a few technical requirements for your server environment to ensure it can handle tasks like large file uploads and secure processing.

PHP Version: Your server must be running PHP 7.4 or higher.

PHP Extensions:
You need to have the following PHP extensions enabled:

• OpenSSL: This is crucial for encrypting your artwork files securely.
• ZipArchive: This is used for optional compression during the file upload process.

Server Configuration for File Uploads:
Since you will be uploading high-resolution artwork, your server’s PHP configuration must allow for large files. We recommend values of 100MB or greater for the following settings in your php.ini file:

• upload_max_filesize
• post_max_size
• memory_limit

You should also ensure max_execution_time is set to a reasonable value (e.g., 300 seconds) to prevent timeouts during processing. If you’re unsure how to change these, please contact your web hosting provider for assistance.

WordPress CRON:
The WordPress CRON system must be active and running correctly. The plugin uses it for essential background tasks, such as automatically fetching updated pricelists from our server each day.

File Permissions:
Your server must have write permissions for the wp-content/uploads/ directory, as the plugin will create and manage files in a sub-directory named drop-print.

To use the plugin, you must have an active Drop Print account.

The plugin needs to connect to our fulfillment service to download pricelists, process your files securely, and manage your orders. This connection is authenticated using details from your Drop Print account.

If you don’t have an account yet, you can sign up on the Drop Print website.

Getting the Drop Print plugin installed on your WooCommerce site is a straightforward process.

Standard Installation Steps:

1. Download the plugin’s .zip file.
2. From your WordPress admin dashboard, navigate to Plugins > Add New.
3. Click the “Upload Plugin” button at the top of the page.
4. Choose the .zip file you downloaded and click “Install Now”.
5. Once the installation is complete, click the “Activate Plugin” button.

Upon activation, the plugin will perform a few setup tasks in the background. It checks if WooCommerce is active and creates a new global product attribute called “Print Dimensions” which is used to manage the different print sizes for your products.

After installing and activating the plugin, the first and most important step is to connect your WordPress site to your Drop Print account. This allows the plugin to fetch your account details, pricelists, and securely send orders for fulfilment.

Navigate to the Drop Print menu item in your WordPress admin sidebar. You will be prompted to connect your account.

3.2.1. First-Time Connection & Seamless Login

Click the “Connect Account” button. This will redirect you to the drop-print.com website to authenticate.

Here’s a nice time-saver: If you are already logged into your Drop Print account in the same browser, you won’t need to enter your password again. The connection will happen in a flash, and you’ll be redirected straight back to your WordPress dashboard. The plugin securely retrieves your connection details from your active session.

3.2.2. Important: Note for Legacy “Alden Fine Print Production” Users

If you are a user of our previous service, Alden Fine Print Production, you will first need to reset your password on the Drop Print website. Please follow the instructions sent to you via email before you attempt to authenticate the plugin.

3.2.3. Important: Note for Web Developers Setting Up for a Client

If you are setting up this plugin for a client, it is crucial to ensure you connect the client’s Drop Print account, not your own. Before you click the “Connect Account” button, we recommend you first visit drop-print.com in a new tab and log out of any active session you might have. Then, return to the plugin settings page and proceed with the connection, logging in with your client’s credentials when prompted.

The Drop Print settings page is your central hub for configuring how the plugin works for your user account. Each WordPress user who manages products can have their own unique settings.

3.3.1. Connection Status & Reloading Account Info
At the top of the page, you can see your current connection status, including the Server URI, your unique Connection ID, your billing currency, and your account status (Standard or Pro). If you’ve recently upgraded to Pro or need to fetch the latest pricelists, click the “Reload Account Info” button. This will trigger a sync with the Drop Print servers.

3.3.2. Your Default Price Margin (%)
This setting allows you to define a default percentage margin that will be added to the base cost of a print to calculate a suggested selling price. For example, a 100% margin will double the base cost. You can always override this suggested price on a per-product basis.

3.3.3. Your Packing Slip
Here you can upload a custom packing slip. This should be a PNG file, ideally designed for A4 paper. If you already have one uploaded, you’ll see its filename and have the option to replace it.

3.3.4. Default Selections (Media, Image Resize, Shipping)
To speed up your workflow, you can set defaults for new products:

• Default Media Selection: Choose the paper type you use most frequently.
• Default Image Resize: Select how your images should scale to fit the print area by default (e.g., ‘Fill Paper Size’).
• Default Shipping Method: (Pro Feature) If you have a Pro account, you can set the default shipping option for your orders.

3.3.5. Auto Production (Pro Only)
This is a powerful Pro feature. When turned ‘On’, the plugin will automatically send your customer’s order to our print servers for fulfilment right after they complete their payment. This creates a fully automated workflow but requires a valid payment card to be on file in your Drop Print account dashboard.

Please be aware of the following important notes regarding compliance and production details.

3.4.1. EU GPSR Compliance for Packing Slips

The General Product Safety Regulation (GPSR) is a significant update to the EU’s product safety framework, which comes into force on 13 December 2024. If you sell products to consumers in the European Union, this regulation applies to you.

Under the GPSR, you are required to provide customers with specific product safety information for every order shipped to an EU destination. We request that you place all relevant safety information directly onto your packing slip design before uploading it to the plugin settings.

3.4.2. Packing Slip Print Details

Please note that all packing slips are printed with black ink only on standard 80gsm plain paper. Currently, full-colour or branded packing slips are not supported.

We are working on a feature for Drop Print Pro customers that will allow for more bespoke branding options both inside and outside the packaging. Stay tuned for updates!

To begin selling a piece of artwork as a print, you first need to enable Drop Print fulfilment for that specific WooCommerce product.

Start by navigating to an existing product or creating a new one (Products > Add New). In the “Product data” section, you will see a series of checkboxes. Simply tick the box labelled “Drop Print”.

When you enable this option, two things will happen:

1. The product type will automatically be set to “Variable product” when you save. This is necessary because Drop Print uses variations to manage the different print sizes you’ll offer.
2. A new tab labelled “Drop Print” will appear alongside the other product data tabs (like General, Inventory, etc.).

Click on this new “Drop Print” tab to open the main panel where all the magic happens.

Once you’re inside the Drop Print panel, you’ll see a large area labelled the “Drop Zone”. This is where you upload your high-resolution artwork file.

You can either drag and drop your file directly onto this area or click anywhere inside it to open a standard file selection window. The plugin supports JPEG, PNG, and TIFF file formats and uses a chunked uploading process to reliably handle large files (up to 256MB).

After you add a file, the panel will transform. The Drop Zone will be replaced by an interface showing a preview of your artwork and the product selection list. The plugin will immediately begin analysing your file to detect its pixel dimensions.

With your artwork uploaded and its dimensions known, you can now choose which print products to offer.

Choosing a Media Type (Paper)
At the top of the product list, you’ll find a dropdown menu for “Media Type”. Use this to select the paper stock you want to use for this artwork, such as Hahnemühle Photo Rag or Canson Infinity Platine. Selecting a media type will load the corresponding list of available print sizes and their base prices.

The Product List & Quality Score
The plugin automatically analyses your image against each available print size and provides a Quality Score. This score, shown as a percentage bar, indicates how well your image resolution (DPI) and aspect ratio fit that specific print size.

• A high score (e.g., 90-100%) means your image is a perfect or near-perfect fit for that size, resulting in an excellent quality print.
• A medium score suggests the print quality will still be good, but perhaps not optimal.
• A low score indicates that your image’s resolution is too low, and printing at that size may result in a blurry or pixelated image.

To protect your reputation, the plugin will disable the selection checkbox for any print sizes that have a “Poor” quality score.

Before setting your final prices, it’s vital to understand how shipping costs are handled.

How Shipping Rate Estimates Work
The shipping costs displayed in the product list are estimates based on the lowest-cost available option. The final shipping cost for an order depends entirely on the customer’s delivery address, which is unknown at the product creation stage. A print shipped locally will cost less than one shipped internationally.

Checking Live Rates for Specific Destinations
To develop an accurate pricing strategy, you need to know what you will actually be charged for shipping. We strongly recommend visiting the Live Quote Page in your Drop Print account dashboard. Here, you can select any print product and a destination country to see the precise, real-time shipping rates.

Strategy for Domestic vs. International Pricing
If most of your customers are in your home country, you can use the Live Quote Page to find your typical “domestic” shipping rate and factor that into your pricing. You can then check a destination that is far away (e.g., Australia if you are in the UK) to get an idea of a maximum “international” rate.

You can then use this information to set up your shipping options within WooCommerce itself. For complex scenarios, we highly recommend reading the official WooCommerce documentation on Flat Rate Shipping to learn how to configure different rates for different customer locations.

For each suitable print size in the list, you can set the final price your customer will pay.

The plugin will display the base cost (what you pay Drop Print for production) and will pre-fill the selling price field based on the default percentage margin you configured in the settings. You are free to change this suggested price to whatever you like by simply typing a new value into the input field.

To choose which print sizes you want to sell, just tick the checkbox next to each one. You can select as many suitable sizes as you wish.

Once you are happy with your selections and prices, you’re ready to create the variations.

This is the final step in the process. After selecting your desired print sizes and setting their prices, you need to stage these changes and then save the product.

First, click the “Create Variations” button at the bottom of the Drop Print panel. This doesn’t save the product immediately; instead, it sends your selections to the plugin to be prepared in the background.

Next, and most importantly, you must click the main WooCommerce “Update” (for existing products) or “Publish” (for new products) button. This final save action triggers the plugin to create all the necessary product variations, attributes, and prices on the front end of your store. Your customers will now be able to see and purchase the different print sizes you’ve just configured.

Once you start receiving orders for your prints, you can easily track their fulfilment status directly from your WooCommerce Orders page.

The plugin adds a new column labelled “Drop Print” to your main order list. This column provides a real-time status indicator for each order being processed by our fulfilment service. The statuses you might see include:

• Quote & Pay: This button appears for orders that require manual payment for production.
• Processing Payment: Payment has been submitted and we are awaiting confirmation from the payment processor and our server.
• Pre-Production: The order is paid and has been successfully added to the print queue.
• In Production: The print is actively being produced by our team.
• Shipped: The order has been dispatched to your customer. You can often click this status to view tracking details.
• File Issue Detected: There’s a problem with the artwork file for this order. This is rare, but if it occurs, clicking the link will direct you to our server to help resolve the issue.
• Payment Failed: An attempt to process payment for this order failed. You can retry using the “Manual Quote & Pay” button.

If you have “Auto-Production” turned off, or if an automatic payment fails, you will need to pay for the production cost of an order manually. This is done through the “Quote & Pay” process.

In the WooCommerce Orders list, find the relevant order and click the “Quote & Pay” button in the “Drop Print” column.

This will open a secure payment modal window. Inside, you will see:

1. A Detailed Quote: An itemised breakdown of the production costs for the prints in the order, along with the shipping cost and any applicable fees.
2. Shipping Method Selection: If you are a Pro user, you will be able to select from available shipping methods (e.g., Standard, Express). For standard users, the default shipping method will be used.
3. Payment Form: A secure form to enter your payment card details. If you are a Pro user with a card on file, you’ll have the option to use it for a quicker checkout.

Once you complete the payment, the order’s status will update, and it will be sent to our production queue. The modal will close, and you’ll see the status change in the order list shortly after.

If you want to replace the artwork for a product or completely start over, you can use the “Reset” function. This provides a clean slate for the Drop Print data associated with a specific WooCommerce product.

You can find the “Reset” button in the bottom actions bar of the Drop Print panel within the product editor.

When you click Reset, a confirmation prompt will appear. Confirming the reset will do the following:

• It immediately clears the currently displayed file preview and any selections you’ve made in the panel.
• It “stages” the product for a full reset. This means it sets a flag in the product’s metadata telling the plugin what to do on the next save.
• The plugin will also attempt to delete the associated preview thumbnail from your Media Library and, if the artwork file is no longer used by any other products, it will schedule the main encrypted file for deletion as well.

Important: The reset is a two-step process. After clicking the Reset button, you must then click the main WooCommerce “Update” or “Publish” button. This final save action is what triggers the plugin to remove all the old Drop Print variations and metadata from the product, completing the process.

Auto-Production is a powerful feature available to Drop Print Pro users that creates a truly hands-off fulfilment workflow.

What it does:
When Auto-Production is enabled, the moment a customer successfully pays for an order containing your Drop Print products, the plugin automatically communicates with our servers in the background. It creates the quote, calculates the final cost, and charges the payment method you have on file in your Drop Print account to pay for the production and shipping. The order is then sent directly into our print queue without you needing to do anything manually.

Requirements for Auto-Production:

1. You must have an active Drop Print Pro subscription.
2. You must have a valid payment card saved in your account dashboard on the Drop Print website.
3. The “Auto Production” toggle in the plugin’s settings page must be set to ‘On’.

If any of these conditions are not met, or if a payment fails, the order will not be processed automatically. Instead, the status will show that it requires manual attention, and you will need to use the “Quote & Pay” process to fulfil the order.

If you need to uninstall the Drop Print plugin, you can do so from the ‘Plugins’ page in your WordPress admin dashboard.

When you deactivate and delete the plugin, it will clean up some data from your WordPress database. Specifically, it will remove:

• All plugin settings stored in the wp_options table (like drop_print_settings).
• Any scheduled CRON events used for syncing pricelists.

However, to prevent accidental and irreversible data loss, the uninstallation process will not remove the following:

• Your Artwork: Any encrypted .afp files you have uploaded will remain in your /wp-content/uploads/drop-print/ directory.
• The Uploads Directory: The /wp-content/uploads/drop-print/ directory and its sub-directories will not be deleted.
• Product Data: The “Print Dimensions” global attribute and any metadata (_drop_print_meta) attached to your products will be kept. This means your product variations will not be deleted.

If you wish to completely remove all traces of the plugin, you would need to manually delete the directory and the product attribute after uninstallation.